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Print ShareThisDoctors across the country are forcing their patients to sign waivers giving up their right to post comments and reviews about them online, a move experts say is unethical and should be prohibited.

Consumer-oriented Web sites like RateMDs and Vitals.com give Web users a chance to recommend and review physicians and hospitals nationwide. But some doctors now are telling their patients to censor themselves — or find another physician.

"This is just the guild trying to protect itself from accountability to those it serves. That's not professional behavior — this is self-interested behavior," said Laurence McCullough, professor of medical ethics at Baylor College of Medicine.

"And as a rule, when a doctor acts primarily out of self-interest, it's ethically suspect."

Among the groups spearheading the move is a company called Medical Justice, which says it is helping protect doctors from online libel, which it says is an "emerging threat" within the medical profession.

Dr. Jeffrey Segal, a former neurosurgeon who founded Medical Justice to help doctors fight off lawsuits, said he robustly supports the sites in theory, but in practice they aren't properly monitored and can do irreparable harm to a doctor's reputation — especially when people pretending to be former patients write phony reviews.

"It was not only patients posting information, but people posing as patients," Segal said, including "disgruntled employees, ex-spouses and competitors."

Segal and other medical experts say that while the ratings sites may have good intentions, little of the information they impart is of use, as the most important indicators of clinical care can only be judged by experts. The rest, they say, is just "random discussion."

"I think the real problem is that the info may not be all that useful," said Dr. Wendy Mariner, a law professor and director of the Patients' Rights Program at Boston University. "Patients may be able to evaluate whether a physician is responsive, courteous, on time, provides useful info to the patient," she said, but they cannot judge the most important issues concerning medical care.

But Mariner said the waivers create "an adversarial relationship" between doctors and patients, and could possibly limit options for patients seeking care. "If this kind of thing gains any traction, medical licensing boards will, and I think should, prohibit it," she told FOXNews.com.

Even without action from medical boards, Mariner said patients should be wary of doctors who ask them to muzzle themselves.

"What patient would want to go to a physician that asks for a waiver? It's a big red flag signaling that the physician is afraid of being evaluated," she said.

Under the terms of the agreements, patients promise they "will not denigrate, defame, disparage or cast aspersions upon" their doctors or post comments to any Web pages by name or anonymously, according to one contract obtained by Florida Health News.

Legal experts say private practices are permitted to ask this of their patients, and they do not violate any free speech laws.

But what happens when patients refuse to sign?

Segal said "there may be some" doctors who would refuse treatment to a patient who wouldn't sign the agreement, but that in an emergency those worries would go out the window.

"I don't think anyone will refuse lifesaving treatment because of this," he said. "Any time there's an urgent or emergency situation, you've got to take care of the patient. End of story."

Physicians are required to provide emergency treatment under the Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act, Dr. McCullough said. The American Medical Association allows doctors to choose their patients, but AMA principles of medical ethics say that even private physicians lose that freedom in case of emergencies.

Yet medical experts say they are concerned that if a patient refuses to sign the waiver, he may have no other place to turn.

More, much more at the link. Imagine how this will work when health care is controlled by the government.

The solution to the problem described at the on set of the article is not censorship - it's ownership. People think they can say what ever they like without repercussions. Make people own their words. It's anonymity that is the problem.

which is why we NEED ownership. If I post something on a board such as CU - it should be clear - and it can be through IP addresses but I think something more is needed - that these words are mine and mine alone. Anonymity is the problem.

I am suggesting the possibility that GotNews.com might be a hoax or troll site making @#$% up. I based that comment on the PJMedia article I linked, whose description and quotes from the killer's FB...